Certain types of printing systems are adapted for printing images on large-scale substrates, such as for museum displays, billboards, sails, bus boards, and banners. Some of these systems use so-called drop on demand ink jet printing. In these systems, a carriage which holds a set of print heads scans across the width of the substrate while the print heads deposit ink as the substrate moves.
Solvent based inks are sometimes used in these systems in which an infrared dryer is used to dry off the solvent after the ink is deposited onto the substrate. Systems using solvent based inks are able to print on flexible substrates such as PVC materials and reinforced vinyl. However, solvent based inks are typically considered to be unusable for printing on rigid substrates such as metals, glass, and plastics. Therefore, to print on rigid, as well as flexible substrates, radiation-curable inks such as UV-curable inks are often preferred. For these systems, the ink is deposited onto the substrate and then cured in a post-printing stage. For instance, after the deposition of the ink, the substrate moves to a curing station. The ink is then cured, for example, by exposing it to UV radiation. In other systems, the UV radiation source for curing is mounted directly on the same carriage that carries the set of print heads.